Asus MB169C+ Portable Monitor Review – MB16AC Zenscreen Overview

 

 

So I’ve been researching for a portable monitor for quite some time. AOC makes some cheap ones, but they are obliviously inferior to the Asus ones. With the recent release of Asus MB16AC (aka Zenscreen) on the way, I just want to test the water on how good exactly these portable monitors are.

 

I’m currently working as a financial auditor, I work in client’s office most of the time. I don’t have the luxury of having traditional dual monitor setup. I used to carry two laptops, but even though either one weighed relatively reasonable at 2.7lb, the two combined at 5.4lb is just quite heavy. Both the Asus MB169C+ and MB16AC weighs only 800g (1.76lb) is one lb less, makes it a lot easier to carry around.

 

Since the Zenscreen has not yet shipped, the only choice I have now is last year’s MB169C+, world’s first USB Type C portable monitor. Also the main big difference aside from the infinite edge boarder size between the Zenscreen that MB16AC has a Glare finish vs MB169C+’s matte finish. I would choose the matte display any day. Glares are absolutely disgusting in day to day use unless it’s a touchscreen.

 

Two main issues for portable monitors are:

 

1. Connector – display lag. Traditional USB 2.0/3.0 has limited bandwidth, thus the display lags. Also display drivers are required since the raw signal needs to be processed and compressed before being sent to the display. While the MB169C+ supports DP Alternate USB Type C, it doesn’t require any special software to run. Just think it as a DisplayPort monitor with the disguise of USB Type C connector. Thus the lag is non issue here.

 

 

This solution obviously has big support issue though, currently on the market, there are only few laptops support DP alternate USB Type C, with the Dell XPS 13 9350 being one of them. Not every computer with the USB Type C connector can support this monitor results the high return rate for this MB169C+ model. That’s why in this year’s Zenscreen, Asus introduces the hybrid DP alternate with the USB 3.0. Both standards are supported.

 

2. The brightness suffered. Due to limited power draw (8W) these portable monitors allow, the max brightness on this MB169C+ is only 220 cd/m^2.

 

 

The color accuracy is also not that great, thus not good for photography usage. Also the monitor draws current directly from the laptop, the battery life on laptop suffers drastically.

 

Now the review of the actual unit, I got it from Amazon Warehouse Deal, which is a returned unit. Price is $160 after tax. The design is very yester-year with thick bezels all around. The power light for some reason is placed at the left top corner instead of the traditional right lower corner which is very distracting. Three dimension 379.1 x 235.8 x 8.5 mm. It barely fits in my shoulder bag Urban Reporter 250. Weight 800g which is pretty light. But the included leather case adds another 500g or so, it was a very chunky design. I opt to not use it at all. I’m using the recommended Anker Multi-angle phone holder which works fine. The included USB Type C to USB Type C cable is not the longest cable, but it works fine for put the portable monitor next to the laptop. I wonder if the USB C to C cable from Nexus 5X would work?

 

 

The biggest problem I have with display is that the controls are very clucky. It took me two minutes to figure out how the three buttons work. No, the ASUS DisplayWidget Software which allows adjusting physical control with software does not support MB169C+, however, the upcoming MB16AC Zenscreen does. The display supports blue light filter technology which supposedly helps eye strain.

 

 

I have calibrated the display with i1Profiler calibration tool. I was able to get pretty close match with the calibrated XPS 13 9350 look. I did a lightroom session on it and found the display to have acceptable results.

 

In the end, I don’t think I would keep the MB169C+ as the design is quite outdated. It’s hard to go back with such huge bezel while looking at XPS 13 9350’s infinite edge. The huge bezel means I can barely fit the monitor inside my shoulder bag. The new Zenscreen has the thin bezel, and three size at 359.7 x 226.4 x 8.0 mm, is more reasonable (the horizontal size is 19.4mm shorter than MB169C+). But the glare finish for the upcoming Zenscreen is the final nail in the coffin as looking at a reflective screen is very hard on eyes. The Zenscreen’s launch price is a bit too high at $249 as well. I’ll have to wait longer for the perfect monitor to show up. My dream monitor would be a 3:2 aspect ratio with decent resolution at 14-15 inch. 3:2 aspect ratio is really the ideal ratio for placing the monitor horizontal or vertical position, 16:9 is really too tall which hardly makes any sense to use it vertically. The weight could be further reduced to maybe 600g. And keep the matte finish, or offer touchscreen if it’s glare finish.

LG V20 Sprint LS997 Initial Impression

 

 

Being not impressed with my Galaxy S7, I broke down to order yet another sprint locked phone… This time being the LG V20. I’m a long time LG user despite some unfortunate history with this brand, a low-end Optimus L9 dead in 6mo, and a LG G4 dead with infamous bootloop. Besides these, my other LG G Flex survived and still being used as of this writing. (The nexus 5X built by LG being a recent purchase, not sure how long it will last). I always loved LG software. Especially the wireless storage app, which allows as a samba network device. But unfortunately, this app was removed after Android 4.4. And I have yet to find a replacement for that. Although there are quite a few samba apps on Play Store, all of them require some special kernal which are hard to get by. 

 

 

Before going into the phone impression, let me talk about registration with Sprint MVNO network. My experience with sprint network has been fine contrary to what the internet is saying. Also as long as the phones are sprint locked, joining any MVNO network seems to be smooth, the financial eligibility requirement seems not being affected. I have transferred two LG Volt from Ringplus to tello. I replaced one of them with the GS7 sprint locked version with no issue. I registered a Verizon iphone 6 plus with Ringplus, then ported the number out to google voice. After using AT&T for three month, then registered the phone with tello. This time I registered this LG V20 on Ting. There are about 7 different sim cards for Sprint, as long as you get the right sim card, it should be easy to register the phone onto sprint network. From my understanding, the MEID is used for phone and text, and ICC ID is used for data connection. This LG V20 currently has a ZV5 firmware, which is the last version to support flashing Dirty Santa to unlock bootloader, and sim unlock as a side effect.

   

 

Now back to the phone, all I can say is that the phone is a beast. The always on secondary screen is fully customizable, and very useful. Unlike the GS7 always on screen which drains battery drastically, the secondary screen on V20 barely affects battery performance. And you can even set timer to turn it on and off at your specified time.

 

 

The general battery performance seems to be a little better than G4 since the Sprint firmware has less junk apps built in than the Verizon G4. The standby battery performance is excellent.

 

 

Being a more recent release than GS7, V20 came with the USB-C port. The three size when compared to Oneplus 3 isn’t that big either. The weight though is significantly heavier. The back cover is so slippery that it almost feels like holding a soap in hand. A case is mandatory for this device. The back cover is very easy to open with the provided eject button. The battery at 3200mAh is relatively small compared to other phones with the screen size. But so far the battery performance is decent.

 

 

The most interesting features of the phone are 1. Hi-Fi Quad DAC 2. Dual camera with regular and wide angle lens. I played around with the Hi-Fi Quad DAC with a pair of SONY MDR-7506 and Neutron music player. The sound is very good although the background noise is a bit high. Neutron runs quite stable on this device unlike on G4 it crashed a lot. There is still occasional stuttering when streaming from NAS with high bitrate Hi-Res FLAC files though. It almost made me regret getting the SONY NW-A35HN Hi-Res Walkman.

 

For the dual camera, I don’t think it uses software to simulate the bokeh effect. The two cameras work on their own. I haven’t got too much chance to test out the capability.

MVNO cellphone service journal–A look back at PTel, H2O, Ringplus, Cricket, Project Fi, Tello, Freedompop

 

So here is a look back at various MVNO cellphone services I’ve tried so far. Since I don’t use my phone for calls or texts a lot, I’m mostly looking at cheapest option possible. And I live in big city, so any of the big 4 network all work for me, I have no preference of one carrier over another. I don’t travel in US domestic most of the time. As far as MVNO are concerned, roaming are usually not supported. Also my main number is a google voice number, it made switching carriers super easy. Text messages including MMS on google voice is also free.

1. PTel (PlatinumTel, T-Mobile MVNO) 2013-2015, company went under in January 2016

Various unlocked GSM devices used with this service, including LG Optimus L9 that broke after only 6 month. SONY Xperia ION L28at lasted for a bit longer than a year. LG G Flex for more than a year.

This is the first major service I have after moving my phone service from expensive T-Mobile monthly bill. I usually used a $40 for 150 days pay as you go service. There were usually coupons available to make it even cheaper. Costs were 5 cents per minute for calls, 2 cents for texts, and 10 cents per megabyte of data. The best thing about this service was that any remaining balance roll after refilling. The only downside about this service was that data was very expensive at 10 cents per MB, but otherwise it’s almost the perfect plan. For customer service, I only used emails for communication for 2 to 3 times, they were helpful at porting in numbers and billing processing.

2. H2O (AT&T MVNO) 2016

Verizon LG G4 (GSM is unlocked by default) and Oneplus 3

 

After PTel went under in January 2016, I have to move the service to H2O. They offer similar pay as you go rate as PTel. I usually used a $10 for 90 days rate. Costs were 5 cents per minute for calls, 5 cents for texts, and 10 cents per megabyte of data. The downside is that the remaining balance did not roll. If you didn’t use up all the balance, they were gone after refilling. It wasn’t a super good alternative to PTel. For customer service, I have to call them for port in, they were helpful and the operators are US based. The website is very unintuitive, I never got it work under Chrome. The good side is that the SIM cards are cheap. It’s good for those port-in promotions if you ever want to try some new service.

3. Ringplus (Sprint MVNO) Nov 2015-Jan 2017, company went under in February 2017

Sprint locked LG Volt

  

This service was fun while it lasted. It certainly has changed my way of using cellphone service. The plan I had was Leonardo 4. (they must at least have over 100 different plans over the one year span) Free: $0 for Unlimited RingPlus-to-RingPlus Voice & Text + 1400 Voice, 1400 Text and 1200 MB + tethering per month. My cost for the entire 1 year and 2 months was only the phone and the $20 top up ($65 total including tax). The LG Volt is a very basic android phone, but since tethering is included, I just use the hotspot feature, the connection was mostly stable. The service changed two ways of how I use cellphone: 1. Now I carry two cellphones all the time, it doesn’t feel too much of a burden since the LG Volt was small enough. (Now upgraded to Samsung Galaxy S7) 2. Data, now I can’t live without data. On average, I would consume 600MB-800MB data per month for light browsing, social media, and Google Maps. Ringplus also had the most intuitive user interface for all the carriers I’ve tried. Although towards the end, the optional add-on seems quite confusing. No, I’m not bothered with the ringplus radio every time I make a phone call. A perk that I see no others have offered is the Fluidcall, which is VOIP based phone number. You can use your number anywhere WIFI is available. This also gets around the restriction that you account gets deactivated if no activity for 30 days (or 60 days?). This is useful when I travel out of the country. Although it seems blocked in China, using a VPN resolves the problem. Too bad they couldn’t figure out a working business model before it’s too late. Those ridiculous offerings towards the end is a pretty clear sign that they can’t last…

4. Cricket (AT&T MVNO), Dec 2016

Oneplus 3

I only signed up for this service to terminate the H2O service by porting in the number, also got a pretty decent sign up bonus. I had the $30 plan for only one month. Unlimited talk, text and 1GB data. Customer service is helpful in port-in my number. Other than that, I can’t say much about this service. The advantage of this service is the group plans, the best value got be the $100/mo for 5 lines, each line has Unlimited Talk, Text, and Data access - with 4 GB of high-speed data. But unfortunately I don’t need 5 lines. There are also perks like rewards points and referral bonus.

5. Project Fi (Automatically switches between T-Mobile, Sprint, and US Cellular)

Nexus 5X and Oneplus 3

To get started with project Fi, the cost would be a bit steep as they only support very few devices. I got a Nexus 5X to just try out this service. It is particularly convenient for travelers as it supports over 135 countries so that you don’t have to buy a local sim card. Depending on where you travel, the cost may not be that attractive though. The plan is $20 for unlimited talk and text plus $10/1 GB of data. You get refunded for any unused data. They also offer free data only sim cards that you can put into any unlocked GSM device.

One particular good usage for this service is to get around the GFW in China as all data are routed back to US before sending back to your device even though you are roaming on Chinese local network. This means you can access Google, Facebook, Instagram etc which typically are blocked in China without using a VPN service. Google map is subject to geoshifting in big cities such as Shanghai.

Project Fi uses China Mobile (default) and China Unicom as partners when you roam. If you manually forces to use China Unicom, you’ll get at least 3G HSPA+ speed in rural area and 4G LTE in big cities. Although the latency could be very high (400-500ms), I have no trouble using VOIP such as Hangouts to call any US number. I end up cancelling the service since the cost is too much for what I need in US domestic. It takes 3 months for Google to refund any remaining credits or deactivate your phone from their network. Maybe later whenever I travel to China, I will restart the service and then pause the service when I don’t need it.

Project Fi also offers perks such as referral and FlyWithFi travel trolleys in certain US airports. Also when the service is paused, you get refunded. So it might be possible pause it before you sleep and resume the next day when you awake to save 1/3 bill. This is a stretch though.

6. Tello (Sprint MVNO)

Sprint locked Samsung Galaxy S7

This is a newcomer in US market, it just celebrated its first anniversary. It’s introduced as one of the options when Ringplus went under. It’s basically Ting without the mandatory $6 monthly fee. The lowest monthly plan with data (must be greater than $5) you could get is 100 min+200MB data which will cost $7 plus taxes. The data is 200MB LTE then throttled to 64KB afterwards. I also find that if you manually switch plan each month, you could keep your unused minutes rolling. This is now my daily driver since it’s about the cheapest plan I could find. Hope this company will be there with the same rate for at least the next 3 years to justify my impulse purchase of the locked Galaxy S7.

7. FreedomPop (AT&T MVNO)

Oneplus 3

This is the type of company that lures people in by offering free data plan (voice and texts are strictly VOIP based), then charging people base on their ignorance. This is much like ringplus but they have a sustainable business model. I have been using it for almost 5 months as an alternative to ringplus free data. It works fine so far as I have followed the instruction to disable any charges. They uses three different carriers, CDMA with Sprint which gives free 500MB base data; GSM with Three UK roaming on AT&T, aka 3G Global which gives free 200MB base data; GSM with AT&T, aka 4G LTE which gives free 200MB base data. All plans you can add 10 friends to get additional 500MB bonus data which is pretty easy to do. It’s also possible to give upto 100MB data each month if you have multiple accounts or actual friends who have no use of their data. The 3G Global sim data are routed back to UK which gives huge latency, and the connection is persistently slow, I would highly suggest get the 4G LTE sim. The user interface is pretty terrible as it’s designed to get you confused with hidden charges, the plan, the service, and the credit are all in different sections. To cancel plan or service, you have to click those tiny texts that you will need magnifiers to see. The credits to stop the auto charge are disabled randomly even though I have used at least 5MB data each month. People are also experiencing downgrading bugs.

The plan is strictly data based. In order to use VOIP for calls and texts, you have to use their app. I tested it briefly and it seems to work fine. But I prefer simpler ways to just use google voice app or hangout dialer. There are ways to extract user name and password from the app to use in any VOIP app, but I haven’t bothered to try it out. The service itself seems pretty good despite all the quirks.

Summary:

So far, I’m pretty happy with Tello with the $7 monthly plan. But if you don’t want to be locked into Sprint which has only limited support to very specific phone models and Sim cards.

The next cheap and reliable service seems to be MintSim’s 3 month for $35 promo plan with unlimited talk, text, 2GB LTE data which is on T-Mobile. Just use google voice and change service every 3 month. This would be my backup plan if Tello ever increases price or going under.